Bruised
by Pepper9873
Summary: Set after Extreme Risk. B'Elanna gets injured during a Borg attack, and doesn't tell Tom about it. Worst summary I've ever written.


A/N: Not the most original title, but I was up since 2:00 in the moring writing this, and that was the only title I could think of. This is my first time writing an angst story, but I hope it works. Please leave a review.

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters mentioned in the story, they are the respectful property of Paramount, I just write stories about them.

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She was used to pain. Pain was a constant part of her life, whether it be physical, or mental. She had taught herself to ignore the pain. The mental pain was hard to ignore, like trying to block out an annoying sibling. However, the physical pain was easier to ignore, just as long as it did not increase in intensity. So, as the last volley of weapons fire sent her into the adjacent control panel, B'Elanna only allowed a few microseconds for the pain coursing through her lower abdomen and upper thigh to distract her.

She had to get the weapons back only, or end up spending the rest of her time as a Borg drone. B'Elanna was quickly running out of time, as she had already exhausted every source of energy she had. In a last ditch attempt, she decided to transfer enough energy from the warp core to power the weapons, since Voyager wouldn't have been able to outrun the Sphere on a good day.

With the transfer completed, B'Elanna slapped her combadge, opening a comlink to the Bridge. "Torres to Janeway, the weapons are back online!" she shouted over the chaos that was now Main Engineering.

It had only been a few hours since the Borg attack, but to him it felt more like days. As he walked down the corridors of Deck 2, Tom realized how lucky he was. Many people didn't make it through their first Borg encounter; he had survived several. He also had a beautiful girlfriend to go through them with.

As Tom entered the Mess hall, he finally noticed how hungry he actually was. He rapidly took a tray from Neelix, and began to scan the room for B'Elanna. He found her sitting with Harry and Seven at one of the larger tables.

"I don't think that we'll be able to power the replicators anytime soon." Tom overheard B'Elanna say as he approached the table.

"Mind if I join you?" he asked when he was less than a foot away.

"Do you really need to ask?" Harry responded, pointing to the empty seat next to B'Elanna.

Tom placed his tray on the table, and sat down. He noticed B'Elanna was spreading her food around with her fork. He lightly tapped her on her shoulder to get her attention. When he got it he asked, "Are you feeling alright?"

She seemed distracted when she answered, "Uh, yeah, I'm fine. I'm just not as hungry as I thought. I think I should get back to Engineering. I'll see you later." she said as she left the table.

"Is she limping?" Seven asked as B'Elanna walked away. Tom looked carefully at B'Elanna's gait, but didn't notice anything different. He figured that Seven's ocular implant was detecting something his eyes couldn't, but there was definitely something B'Elanna wasn't telling him.

B'Elanna's shift was finally over, and all she wanted to do was lie down. As soon as the door safely concealed her in her quarters, she began stripping off her uniform, revealing a large bruise that started from her belly button, and went down to her thighs. She carefully covered it with pajamas, and curled up into her bed. B'Elanna was slowly drifting to sleep when the door chime sounded. "Come in."

Tom soon entered the room. "Looks like you started without me." he said when he saw her discarded uniform on the floor. He walked over to the bed, gently took the covers off of her, and carefully crawled on top of B'Elanna. He began trailing kisses from the base of her neck, to his desired destination, her lips.

As he moved his way up, he was inadvertently applying pressure on B'Elanna's bruise. He was about to kiss her lips before she turned her head to hide her cringing face. Tom was clearly confused as he sat up.

He turned her head so she was facing him, he was going to get an answer from her, he wasn't about to just let it slide. "B'Elanna, is something wrong? And if there is, is it because of me?" His eyes were desperately looking for an answer within hers.

"It's not because of you. I'm not feeling so well." She was hoping he would leave it at that, but with the recent events, she doubted that he would.

"Alright." B'Elanna was shocked; usually he would have continued to ask her questions until he finally got the answer he was looking for.

Tom shifted his wait to get off, putting pressure on the bruise yet again. B'Elanna muffled the cry she let out as best as she could. "I'm sorry; I didn't mean to hurt you." Now Tom knew that she was hiding something, she never cried from pain when their bodies were in contact with each other's.

"I know." she finally replied.

"Let me look at your side." Before she could stop him, Tom pulled B'Elanna's top up. "Where did you get this?" he asked as he caught sight of the bruise.

"I was thrown against a console during the Borg attack."

"And you didn't go to see the Doctor?" As soon as the words left his mouth, he realized he shouldn't have said that. Although he hadn't intended for it to sound like he was accusing her of ignoring her injuries, it was apparent to him that she thought he was.

She felt like she needed to be defensive as she said, "I did go, but I left because all four of the biobeds were occupied by critically injured crewmembers. "

"I know, I shouldn't have said that. I didn't mean to accuse you." His eyes were now pleading her to forgive him.

She sat up, and pecked him on the cheek. "Apology accepted." B'Elanna gave him a small smile

Tom kissed her softly on the lips. "I'll be right back." he said before leaving.

Tom came back with a medical tricorder, a hyper-spray, and a dermal regenerator. Sitting back on the bed, Tom pressed the hyper-spray into B'Elanna's neck. Then he ran the tricorder over her bruised area to check for internal injuries. After not finding any, he used the regenerator to rid her of the unsightly bruise.

When he finished, Tom got ready to return to his quarters. Before he could walk away, B'Elanna grabbed his arm, then dragged him back down, and enveloped his lips into a deep kiss. "You don't have to go." she whispered when she finally pulled away.

"Computer, dim lights." He kissed her passionately as the lights slowly faded.


End file.
